Existing In Fear
by zanziba
Summary: What would have happened if Angel hadn't decided to leave at the end of Series 3? Would their love have survived? TISSUE WARNING!!


TITLE: Existing in fear  
  
SERIES: probably stand-alone but who knows?  
  
AUTHOR: zanziba  
  
COPYRIGHT: November 2001  
  
DISTRUBUTION: Ask first pls. E-mail: i_have_a_soul@foreverangel.zzn.com  
  
RATING: R, but possibly this may change.  
  
CATEGORY: Buffy/Angel, angst/romance  
  
DISCLAIMER: I don't own any of the characters from BTVS or ANGEL.  
  
FEEDBACK: yes please!  
  
SUMMERY: What would have happened if Angel hadn't decided to leave at the end of Season 3. Would their love have survived? Be warned : SERIOUS ANGST.  
  
I'm sorry, I was very depressed when I wrote this having just watched Graduation Part 2 but please read!  
  
THANKS: to Bex, my bestest bud who blames herself for the existance of this fic due to her abandonment of me in my moment of need!  
  
The lyrics are from Ronan Keating's 'Loved By You' - and yes, I know that my taste in music is tragic, but the lyrics were jost SO B/A I had to include them. Also Sarah McLachlan's song ' Fear', which is where I got the inspiration for this fic from.  
  
  
  
"How many years do you think you could exist with words and promises before you'd need something more physical?"  
  
"It wouldn't matter,"  
  
"It would. That's what love does. No matter how deeply it's rooted in the heart and soul, it eventually demands physical completion. If I stayed here, with you, we could deny those needs--maybe for years--but not forever. Love either receives its demands, or it dies.  
  
  
  
' Until All The Stars Go Out ' - zanziba  
  
  
  
Buffy shifted in her sleep. Mumbling to herself in weariness she opened her eyes and took in her surroundings. She was in a quite large white-washed room with stone walls and beams across the ceiling. She was lying in a huge four-posted double bed with silk sheets and velvet drapes. The same place she had woken up every morning for two years. The body lying next to hers moved closer to her, his arms coming around her hips in a familar gesture which he performed towards her even unconciously in his sleep. Protection.  
  
It wasn't yet day, in fact it was still the middle of the night but Buffy had somewhere to be. She glanced at the clock. 2.16. 'shit', she thought to herself ' I'm late'. She slipped out of bed quickly and quietly, removing his arms from around her waist and placing them gently next him. There were some clothes that she had left out on a chair the night before and these she put on now, fumbling at the buttons in the dark. She didn't dare turn on the light in case she woke him. This done, she turned towards the door and grasped the handle before thinking better of it and walking quietly back to the bed. She stood and watched him for a few seconds as he slept before reaching over and kissing him lightly on the cheek. As she tucked the sheets up around his face, she whispered " I love you" to his sleeping form. And as she tiptoed silently out of the door, the tears in her eyes shone brightly from the glow of the moon. The door shut quietly, taking with it her choked sob. " I'm sorry ".  
  
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As the door closed shut behind her, Angel's eyes flickered open. He lay there completly still until he heard the crunching of the gravel beneath her feet fade into the distance as she walked down the driveway. When there was nothing to be heard but the rustling of the leaves outside, he burst into bitter, stifled sobs.  
  
This wasn't the first time it had happened. In fact, it had been happening quite frequently over the last two or three months. About three times a week she would slip out of bed at around 1.45am, she would get dressed quietly and leave the house. Before she did that she would always, always kiss him and tell him she loved him as he lay there feigning sleep, while he could feel his heart being ripped in two. At length she would return, undress and slip into bed beside him before drifting off to sleep. He could never sleep on these nights, instead he would lie there, silent tears running down his cheeks as he tried to imagine what she had done that night. Sometimes he would get so angry that he could feel the demon inside him flaring up and it took all the strength he could muster to suppress it. Occasionally, he would drift off into fantasies about it being him she craved, not some frat boy. He would replay the one night they had had together until it nearly drove him crazy, remembering every moan, every single caress. He had built up that one night so much, creating snippets of tender kisses and whispered words, that now he wasn't sure which bits were his and which were real. It occupied his every thought on those lonely nights, when his love was elsewhere.  
  
Once I ruled the earth  
  
Once upon a time  
  
When I had your love  
  
That's when the world was mine  
  
When I had your love  
  
That's when the world was mine  
  
He remembered the night when it had started. Buffy had gone to a lecture in LA. She had told him that she would be back by 8.00. 8.00 came and went, he started to get anxious and was just about to get in the car and go see if there had been an accident, when the phone rang. It was Buffy. They had broken down and wouldn't be back until late. She warned him not to wait up. He remembered feeling puzzled because of the way she had acted, cold, and decisive. He had heard a man's voice in the background and the thought had occured to him but he pushed it away almost immediately. ' Buffy would never do that, she loves me. How can think that of her? ' , and as for her attitude, 'she must be tired'. He had refused to accept even for a second that there might be something else going on.  
  
Even though Buffy had warned him not to stay up, he decided that she might need a hot drink and a bit of TLC after being stuck in the cold for so long, so he waited. At about midnight, he heard a car come up the gravel driveway and he walked over to the window to see who had given her the lift. He watched, but no movement came from the car. The blackened windows and the shadow the house was giving off made it very hard to see what was going on the car. After another minute or two and still no movement, Angel thought he should go see what was going on. He was about to move away from the window, when all of a sudden a door opened. He watched a young man with sandy blond hair climb out of the car, and walk round the other side of the car to the passenger door and open it. He recognised the man from the Bronze. He was the TA in Buffy's psych class, and they had been introduced one night. His name was Riley Finn.  
  
Riley held the door open and Buffy climbed out. She looked a little flushed, and Angel remembered wondering if she was unwell. He watched them as they exchanged words and Riley hugged Buffy. He was very aware of the fact that Buffy seemed to be hugging Riley back. Then, as Angel watched, Riley bent down and kissed Buffy on the lips. In a flash, Angel was at the door. He pulled it open swiftly, but the kiss was over and Buffy was now making for the door as Riley was climbing back into the car. She looked up in surprise when she saw him there, and he thought he saw a momentary look of guilt, but it was quickly replaced by a smile. As she ran into his arms that night, he remembered the moment when he forgot everything he had just been witness to. She was his girl, and nobody could ever stand in the way of that.  
  
One day, about a week after the fateful lecture, Buffy seemed to be even more loving towards him than usual. They spent a lot of the day talking and holding hands, and as evening drew on, they sat in front of the fire reading together, as Buffy lay curled up on his lap. He went to bed that night, happier than he had been for a long time.  
  
In the middle of the night, he woke up. Without opening his eyes, he reached out with his hand, fumbling for Buffy in the dark. When all he felt was cold sheets under his palm, he opened his eyes. Buffy wasn't there. Thinking that she must have gone to get a drink or the like, he slipped on a t-shirt and went downstairs, eyes still half-closed from sleep, determined to find his love. There were no lights showing and the house seemed to be engulfed in darkness but he strove on. After searching every room in the house, it became clear that she most certainly had not gone to get a drink. Confused, but still determined, he went back up to their bedroom, hoping to find some clue to her whereabouts. As he entered the room, he looked about, everything seemed to be in order, but where was she? Angel saw something lying at his feet and picked it up, recognising them at once. It was her pyjama bottoms, so she must have gone out. He looked around for some sort of affermation of this and sure enough, he found one. Her clothes, which she had neatly folded on the chair by the window earlier that evening were gone.  
  
He dressed quickly and left the house. As he was walking down the driveway, it occured to him that he had absolutly no idea where she had gone. He remembered thinking briefly that she may have gone to the graveyard, but he dismissed the idea soon enough. ' Surely she would have told me if she had gone slaying? She knows that it would be extremly irresponsible not to tell me or leave a note or anything in case something happened to her'. He shuddered at the thought or something happening to his precious baby and made the decision to go to the cemetary, just in case. After searching Longfield cemetary, and finding only a couple of vamps, he gave up on that idea. He wandered down the high street, aimlessly searching for any sign of where she might have gone. After an hour or so, feeling hopelesly lost, he returned home, praying Buffy would be there to greet him with a smile when he got back. He couldn't stand the idea that something might have happened to her.  
  
As he walked up the driveway, the house appeared to be in darkness. A great sense of foreboding overcame him but he shook it off. He pushed open the door, walked inside and called her name. No answer. He felt himself begin to shake, and tried to stop himself. He had to be strong. Angel walked over to the fridge and took out some blood. After warming it up in the microwave, he sipped it slowly, just to calm his nrves. After waiting for some time downstairs, he decided to go back up to bed. After all, there wasn't much he could do just waiting there, he might as well get some sleep and if she wasn't back by morning then he would call Giles. He could just be blowing this way out of proportion, she might have just gone out for a walk and when he woke up in the morning she could be lying there next to him, as beautiful as ever, completly unaware of the panic she had put him through the night before. He smiled to himself as he climbed back into bed, but underneath his cool exterior, he was terrified.  
  
When Angel woke up the next morning, he found Buffy sleeping peacefully next to him. When she woke up, he was about to ask her where she had been, when something stopped him. He wasn't sure what it was at the time, thinking back on it now, it might have been the fear of her answer that his subconcious had been afraid of, but as far as he knew then, it wasn't important. She was there now, and that was all that mattered.  
  
Days passed, and their lives went on as normal. Evenings at the Bronze, meetings with the gang, sleeping in the same bed.......looking in on it, nothing had changed, but it had, and Angel knew it. It was like an invisible barrier had been put up between them, and Angel felt it strongly. Everytime he reached out to touch her, he had to mentally check with himself that he was actually allowed to do it, and when he whispered words of love to her in the dead of night, he somehow felt that her spontaneos declaration back wasn't quite as heartfelt as it used to be. He wasn't quite sure what had happened between them, but he was too terrified to talk to her about it.......terrified of losing her, and terrified of what the reason for it was.  
  
For every mountain I have climbed  
  
And every raging river crossed  
  
You were the treasure that I longed to find  
  
Without your love I would be lost  
  
About a week after the night when Angel had woken up without her for the first time, it happened again. This time, he didn't get out of bed to look for her, but waited patiently for her to return. When she came in, he kept his eyes closed, feigning sleep. A part of him felt guilty for decieving her like that, but he had to know. Buffy got undressed and into bed beside him quickly. Soon she had drifted off into a deep sleep. Angel opened his eyes, cold tears already threatening to break free. He knew where she had been. His worst nightmare had become reality, and he turned away from her in pain. He could smell it all over her, the sweat, her arousal - now fading but most definatly perceptible, and worst of all, the stench of sex and the smell of another man. A man he knew, granted not well, but he could recognise that smell anywhere. Riley Finn.  
  
That was months ago now though. And as Angel lay there, once more alone, he felt the surge of anger once more rise up in him. He hadn't said a word. All those months while his love was decieving him, he had kept quiet. It had taken all the self-control he could muster after nearly 250 years on the planet to stop himself from ripping the boy's throat out and claiming Buffy as his own once more. The animal instinct of the demon still controlled him very strongly and the thought of someone like that touching his precious girl strengthened it even more.  
  
Angel had accustomed to what happened on the night Buffy was leaving to meet Riley on. The routine was so predictable that he could tell that it was one of those nights from almost the moment the day began. As on the first time, Buffy became much more loving towards him than normal - well, not normal for their relantionship overall ( he vividly remembered a time not so long ago when these ' special ' days were every day ), but normal for the past few months. Angel slowly became so lost during the normal days when the barrier existed that he began to long for these days, but dread the nights that were to follow.  
  
Love is not blind - It sees more and not less,  
  
but because it sees more it is willing to see less  
  
Angel quickly closed his eyes as he heard the stairs creaking under the weight of Buffy's footsteps. He couldn't face her, not yet. He had to soon though. This just couldn't go on, he'd have to say something to her sooner or later. Did he have to? Couldn't he just go on as they were? They were together, that should be all that mattered, but they weren't and deep down, Angel knew it. They had stopped being 'together' that first day when Buffy had lied to him. Of course, they were still together in the physical sense of the world, but not in the most important sense of it. Their souls weren't together and their hearts had to reach further and further out to find each other as each day passed. No, it couldn't wait. He had to confront her about it, otherwise it would be too late.......their love would have extinguished forever.  
  
Buffy settled into bed beside him and fell a deep slumber within moments. ' Riley must have really worn her out tonight' , Angel thought to himself for a second, before pushing that painful thought back into the deep recesses of his mind. He lay there thinking for a while before gradually falling into a fitful sleep. He tossed and turned all night, daunted by the thing he now found himself about to do. He was going to confront Buffy about Riley. HE was going to confront HER. He would make her choose between them. ' But what if she chooses Riley over me.....he can give her everything I can't. Why would she choose me over someone like him. Someone who can love her completly like she deserves to be loved. Someone who can go out in the sunshine with her, who can have children with her..................someone who can make love to her.' Silent tears tricked down his face as he slept.  
  
I have so much to lose herein this lonely place,  
  
Tangled up in your embrace, and  
  
There's nothing I'd like better than to fall,  
  
But I fear I have nothing to give.  
  
Wind in time rapes to flower trembling on the vine,  
  
And nothing yields to shelter from above.  
  
They say tempation will destroy our love,  
  
The never-ending hunger,  
  
But I fear I have nothing to give.  
  
I fear I have nothing to give.  
  
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- NOTE: THIS IS JUST TO TELL ALL YOU READERS OUT THERE NOT TO WORRY. I AM A B/A FAN AND SHIPPER NOT A B/R. THIS IS FIRST AND FOREMOST A B/A FIC, AND YOU CAN BE ASSURED EVERYTHING WILL FALL INTO PLACE BY THE TIME I HAVE WRITTEN THE NEXT CHAPTER. DON'T LOSE HOPE! CHAPTER 2 WILL FINISHED AND PUT UP IN A WEEK OR TWO.  
  
" because I want you so badly! I want to take comfort in you and I know it will cost me my soul and a part of me doesn't care..." Angel " Amends " 


End file.
